Merri Franquin

[1] Franquin's collaboration with Romanian composer Georges Enescu (1881–1955) led to the composition in 1906 of Légende, one of the great twentieth-century works for solo trumpet and piano.

A more modern form of this instrument was introduced to American symphony orchestras by Georges Mager, and it remains very much in popular use in the United States.

Merri Franquin was born 1848 in the small Bouches-du-Rhône town of Lançon in southern France.

There he played cornet in the Marseille Casino Musical and later as soloist at the Palais Lyrique and the Théâtre Chave.

In 1870 he became solo flugelhornist with the band of the Marseille Garde National, and in 1872 he was admitted to the Paris Conservatory where he joined the cornet class of the famous cornetist Jean-Baptiste Arban.